Car Trouble
by ucferrarisgirl
Summary: Frank witnesses an accident


Car Trouble  
  
The three men pushed the rusty car down the road. Just a little further along, the road sloped downhill ever so gently, but Frank could see that the car would crash before getting started.   
  
"You need to be inside the car!" Frank called out from his black BMW convertible. The day was warm--mid 60's for Chicago--and sunny for a winter's day on the Great Lakes.   
  
The three men paid him no heed and kept pushing the rusted car, trying to get start the car's engine with a rolling start.  
  
Their attempt would fail.  
  
"You need to be inside the car to brake it! Otherwise it's going to crash into the bus shelter!" Frank yelled out a bit more loudly, thinking perhaps the men didn't hear him.   
  
He watched placidly, as he waited for the light to change, as the rusted car gained momentum. As he had thought, the car gathered speed. One of the men tried to run alongside the car, perhaps hoping to jump in to brake the car. The car rolled slightly to the right and up onto the grassy median separating the sidewalk from the curb.   
  
The rusted car door bounced off a street sign next to the curb and the driver's side window glass shattered.   
  
A few feet later, the car obediently bounced off the metal framing of the bus shelter and popped out the safety glass on the side of the bus shelter.  
  
The left front of the car was pushed back rather impressively towards the steering wheel.   
  
A car horn beeped behind Frank. Frank took his Guccied foot off the brake and applied the gas. His BMW smoothly started forward, the engine purring like a cat. He was just about to put on the left turn signal when he glanced in his rear view mirror. A Chicago policeman had already arrived at the scene, and a half dozen pedestrian witnesses were coming forward to tell the police what happened.   
  
Frank made a decision. He'd seen an accident and although there were other witnesses, he'd stop off and give his report of what he'd seen. Insurance fraud was on the rise, and perhaps the three men would be thinking about trying to get insurance to pay for a new--or at least used--car by fradulently claiming one or more of the men was inside the car at the time of the accident.   
  
There had been no one in the car while they were trying to roll-start the rusted contraption (and Henry Ford would have been appalled to see how poorly one of his cars had been maintained). Frank turned on the left signal, and was greeted with a long horn blast from the car behind him.  
  
Frank merely glanced in the rear view mirror. A woman was gesticulating wildly at him. When she noticed Frank watching her, she gave him the finger. Frank merely looked away, then turned the beamer left. He pulled across the opposing lane of traffic and into an empty space in the small garden style apartment complex directly behind the bus shelter.  
  
He got out of the beamer, and noticed the gesticulating woman do a double take when she saw him. Frank pointed in front of her, and when she looked in front of her, she had to slam on the brakes rather hard, which caused her to go fall forward. Frank saw the drink in the drink holder splash all over the driver's side, which included the lady. Served her right, Frank thought.  
  
He went over to inspect the damage to both the car and the bus shelter. Surprisingly, aside from the shelter's safety glass popped out of its frame, the bus shelter had only sustained paint damage. The rusted Ford had sustained major engine damage, and would need to be scrapped.  
  
"Frank Donovan, Justice Department," Frank said to the Chicago police officer when he looked up after taking a teenage girl's statement about what she had seen.  
  
"The Justice Department is here for an traffic accident?" asked the pimply teenage boy standing next to the girl, who undoubtedly was his girlfriend.  
  
Frank replied placidly, "I saw the accident and stopped off to give my statement." The boy looked a bit scared, so Frank added, "when one sees an accident, one needs to give a statement to the police." The boy didn't look any more consoled, so Frank decided to let him be and turned his attention to the Chicago cop.  
  
"You're the one who negotiated for the release of one of my buddies during the bank hostage," he stated to Frank. He was young, very young, obviously just graduated from the police academy. "Thank you for getting him out alive," he continued.   
  
"You're welcome," Frank said. "Now for my statement." The cop was all business, his pen ready to take down Frank's word.   
  
"The three men," Frank indicated with his hand, "were trying to roll-start the car. None of the men was in the car while they were pushing it. As the car gained momentum down the slight hill, one of the men," Frank now indicated the man in the red plaid shirt, "tried to run alongside the car. The driver's side door was open. He was trying to get into the car in an attempt to brake the car," The man in the plaid shirt glanced at his friends. The officer's pen scritched on his pad.  
  
Frank's eyes narrowed just a bit and he continued. "The driver's side door bounced off the street sign there." Frank's hand indicated the street sign just a few inches from the curb. "The driver's side window glass shattered, then the car rolled into the bus shelter, crunching the left front engine like an accordian," Frank said.   
  
He looked at the three men. They were glancing amongst themselves, a bit nervous, Frank thought. Perhaps they had thought about trying to tell the insurance company they were inside the car, or one of them was inside the car when the car went out of control and crashed into the bus shelter.   
  
Then again, perhaps the men were just nervous because of his presence. He'd announced he was Justice Department and from his demeanor, people knew he meant business so few people messed with him.  
  
The teenage girl was looking at him with a mixture of fear and pleasure. He smiled at her, which caused her to blush. "Uh, is it okay if we go now?" she asked the young police officer.   
  
"Yes. I've got your statement. Thank you, Miss Connelly," Officer Burton told her. Her boyfriend tugged on her coat sleeve, pulling her away from the scene.   
  
"Did the boy give you his statement?" Frank asked.  
  
"No. He wasn't watching the accident because his back was turned. He was walking backward in front of his girlfriend.  
  
Frank nodded. He'd seen the teenage couple on the sidewalk, and the boy had been doing just that. His girlfriend had been pointing behind him, but he'd kept ignoring her and had been singing to her. When the rusted Ford had crashed into the bus shelter with a loud bang, he'd spun around and nearly tripped.   
  
The three men were standing around. "Hey, uhm, we gonna get in trouble?" one of them asked.   
  
Both Frank and Officer Burton looked at him. "No. Why?" Officer Burton asked.  
  
"I was just wondering," he said. "I mean, we crashed the car."  
  
"You were trying to give the car a rolling start, and you forgot to put someone inside the car to brake it. The car crashed merely because of stupidity, not because you did anything wrong," Frank said.  
  
Officer Burton's mouth dropped and he gawked at Frank. Frank merely gave him a lifted eyebrow. He addressed the three men again.  
  
"Sorry. But the car is scrap metal. Most likely, if you kept up the insurance premiums, the insurance company will pay for the replacement value of the car. Carmax has some good used car deals," Frank told the three men.   
  
With that statement, Frank decided to leave. He'd given his statement. He turned to Officer Burton. "Have a good day," he said. Officer Burton nodded at him and Frank turned to walk back to his beamer, his Guccied feet softly clicking on the pavement. 


End file.
